Climbed multiple times that winter while working at Isaak Walton Inn. The first summit took place after a guest of the Inn told me they encountered almost no snow on the trail. They lied. So I climbed the mountain in winter conditions without snowshoes...then got called into work. Very tiring day! The views of St. Nick make the whole thing worth it, though!

Good early season snowshoe. I climbed this on the same date several years ago and walked to the lookout. This time we had snowshoes on at the start. Scalplock looked like a 1 story building with the 15+ feet of snow around it and the 8 foot wind drift on top. Spectacular!

Lost the trail around 5,500 feet and went straight up the deep snow from there. Enjoyable ridge walk with impressive cornices en route to the fire lookout. Fantastic views of Saint Nick and the wild southern section of the park. A perfect winter snowshoe!

We had to post-hole a bit of snow for the last few hundred feet but it wasn't bad. This was a beautiful and warm day. We only passed one other hiker on the trail. This is remote and strenuous so no tourists will be found here, great solitude for mountain lovers.

Don't remember the year but it worked out great for a family with 4 children. Too many low clouds for good views. There was a mauling on the trail exactly 2 weeks later and have heard of at least one other since. Sounds like a good trail for Grizz.

I first hiked up to the Scalplock lookout on a day off from working the West Entrance on 8/6/03. The various fires were making the air practically unbreatheable on the west side of the park, so on a suggestion I made it down to Walton to give this a shot. What a beautiful hike--one of my favorite day-hikes. The fields of flowers on the ridge below the final ascent to the summit/lookout are breathtaking. I startled the on-duty lookout as he was coming out of the outhouse, but had a nice conversation.

Returned to Scalplock on 6/30/08 with my friend Tyler. Hottest hike of the summer as it was 100 degrees that day. Still, what a great time--clear skies all around, and saw nobody at all that day! Recently I read Doug Peacock's account of working at that lookout tower in "Grizzly Years" (I'd mistakenly thought he'd worked at Huckleberry); excellent insights into the life of a firewatcher.